The Bouviers : from Waterloo to the Kennedys and beyond [Paperback]

The Bouviers is a must for anyone who loves stories of families in American's Guilded and Jazz Ages. Davis is an entertaining writer, taking us inside the family from its amazing first patriarch. Michel Bouvier, a soldier for Napolean, escapes directly from the Waterloo battlefield debacle, under threat of death, to a ship bound for Philadelphia.

Alone in America with everything gone, Michael takes his cabinet-making skills and builds up an incredible fortune and an equally incredible family, among them a Civil War hero, a Wall Street master, old maid spinsters, Victorian era social climbing, and an actual Canonized Saint, Katherine Drexel. In here, you meet them all. America in the early, mid, and late 1800s comes alive as Michel Bouvier lives the American dream through hard work and careful investments.

The focus of the third generation is Jacqueline Kennedy's grandfather, John Vernou Bouvier, Jr. Born a few months after Lincoln's assassination, the impressive but vain-glorious man solidifies the family's social position in the Victorian era, while beginning to spend "principle" instead of living off only "interest". So while the Bouviers learn to live a luxurious lifestyle, their wealth is slowly leaking away like air from an old tire.

The next generation's namesake, John V. Bouvier III, Jacqueline's father, looks like Clark Gable and is flying high on Wall Street until the 1929 crash cuts him down to a painful middle ground -- no longer truly rich, but unable to trim back on his Jazz Age lifestyle. His brother, Bud, has an impressive World War I combat record, succesfully leading 250 men into battle before being horrible gassed. After coming home, marrying, and trying the oil business in Texas, he descends into abject alcoholism, ultimately dying young out West absent family and friends.

By the time the story gets to our former First Lady, we understand her and her family in a way that no "Jackie!" book can offer. Davis, her first cousin, does not spare her or any of his relatives from shrewd, but thoughtful, insights. Most of what he writes of this early 20th Century generation either he or his mother personally witnessed, yet he does not vainly insert himself into the narrative. He is a writer of immense talent whose prose is very readable and a real pleasure.

The 1993 hard cover version includes a photo section, which you will be grateful for -- these people are so facinating you really want to keep checking back to their pictures.

You will not be disappointed if all you care about is Jacqueline Kennedy -- but do yourself a favor and read from the beginning.

A first rate job through and through. Another excellent book is Davis' The Kennedys: Dynasty and Disaster, although his take of the Kennedys is often quite acerbic. The Kennedys: Dynasty and Disaster Also, 1996's Jacqueline Bouvier: An Intimate Memoir